nep-tid New Economics Papers
on Technology and Industrial Dynamics
Issue of 2015‒11‒07
eight papers chosen by
Fulvio Castellacci
Universitetet i Oslo

  1. The Impact of R&D and ICT Investment on Innovation and Productivity: Firm-Level Evidence from Turkey By Yeşim Gürel Üçdoğruk; Yılmaz Kılıçaslan
  2. Insider Trading and Innovation By Ross Levine; Chen Lin; Lai Wei
  3. How Do Patents Affect Follow-On Innovation? Evidence from the Human Genome By Bhaven Sampat; Heidi L. Williams
  4. Top R&D investors and international knowledge seeking: the role of emerging technologies and technological proximity By Mafini Dosso; Antonio Vezzani
  5. Globalization and Synchronization of Innovation Cycles By Kiminori Matsuyama; Iryna Sushko; Laura Gardini
  6. A macroeconomic analysis of the returns to public R&D investments By Roel van Elk; Bas ter Weel; Karen van der Wiel; Bram Wouterse; Bart Verspagen
  7. Does Cultural Diversity of Migrant Employees Affect Innovation? By Ceren Ozgen; Cornelius Peters; Annekatrin Niebuhr; Peter Nijkamp; Jacques Poot
  8. The impact of cultural diversity on firm innovation: evidence from Dutch micro-data By Ceren Ozgen; Peter Nijkamp; Jacques Poot

  1. By: Yeşim Gürel Üçdoğruk (Dokuz Eylul University, Department of Economics); Yılmaz Kılıçaslan (Anadolu University, Department of Economics)
    Abstract: Measuring the effects of innovative activities on firms’ productivity has been an active area for research for several decades, both as a policy concern and as a challenge for econometric applications. This paper attempts to analyze the relationship among innovation input, output and productivity in Turkish manufacturing firms through CDM model by adding ICT investments together with R&D as an input to innovation. The evidence is based on a panel data sample of Turkish manufacturing firms in the 2003–2010 period, constructed from the waves of the ‘Annual Manufacturing Industry Statistics’ and the four consecutive waves of ‘Community Innovation Surveys’. Regarding the model specification, the first step models the firm R&D decisions in terms of two equations: a selection equation and an intensity equation. The selection equation consists of R&D indicator variable that takes the value 1 if firm decides to perform R&D and explanatory variables affecting R&D decision. The intensity equation consists of firm’s innovative effort and a set of determinants of R&D expenditure. These two equations are estimated by using Heckman selection method. The second step models the firm innovation activity by innovation equation including ICT investment intensity and the latent innovation effort proxied by the predicted value of R&D intensity from the first step model. This equation is estimated as a bivariate probit model, assuming that most of the firm characteristics that affect product and process innovation are the same, although of course their impacts may differ. The last step estimates the productivity equation that is specified as a simple Cobb–Douglas technology with constant returns to scale, and with labor, capital and knowledge inputs, where we have “labor productivity” (real sales per employee, in logs); “investment intensity” that is our proxy for physical capital and “knowledge inputs” that are proxied by the predicted probability of product and process innovation.
    Keywords: R&D, ICT, innovation, productivity, Turkey
    JEL: L60 O31 O33
    Date: 2015
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eyd:cp2015:31&r=tid
  2. By: Ross Levine; Chen Lin; Lai Wei
    Abstract: This paper assesses whether legal systems that protect outside investors from corporate insiders increase or decrease the rate of technological innovation. Based on over 75,000 industry-country-year observations across 94 economies from 1976 to 2006, we find that enforcing insider trading laws spurs innovation—as measured by patent intensity, scope, impact, generality, and originality. Consistent with theories that insider trading slows innovation by impeding the valuation of innovative activities, the relationship between enforcing insider trading laws and innovation is much larger in industries that are naturally innovative and opaque, and equity issuances also rise much more in these industries after a country starts enforcing its insider trading laws.
    JEL: G14 G18 O3 O47
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21634&r=tid
  3. By: Bhaven Sampat; Heidi L. Williams
    Abstract: We investigate whether patents on human genes have affected follow-on scientific research and product development. Using administrative data on successful and unsuccessful patent applications submitted to the US Patent and Trademark Office, we link the exact gene sequences claimed in each application with data measuring follow-on scientific research and commercial investments. Using this data, we document novel evidence of selection into patenting: patented genes appear more valuable — prior to being patented — than non-patented genes. This evidence of selection motivates two quasi-experimental approaches, both of which suggest that on average gene patents have had no effect on follow-on innovation.
    JEL: I10 I18 O34
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21666&r=tid
  4. By: Mafini Dosso (European Commission – JRC - IPTS); Antonio Vezzani (European Commission – JRC - IPTS)
    Abstract: This paper sheds new lights on the internationalization of technological activities of the top corporate R&D investors worldwide. In particular, we provide evidence on the technological factors determining their international R&D location strategies. The empirical analysis is based on the patenting activities of the top R&D investors, as reported by the EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard, at the USPTO over the period 2010–2012. The technological proximity to the host country in which these companies seek for new knowledge is a key determinant for their R&D location decision. However, technological proximity has a non-linear effect on the companies' location strategies as they search for new technologies not too close to their knowledge base. Furthermore, top R&D investors worldwide target countries with comparative advantages in emerging technologies. Countries willing to attract high-value investments should create an environment conducive to the creation and development of brand new ideas with a high potential impact on the long term growth.
    Keywords: International Knowledge seeking, Multinational Corporations (MNCs), Patents, Emerging technologies, Technological proximity
    JEL: O30 F23 L20
    Date: 2015–11
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ipt:wpaper:201509&r=tid
  5. By: Kiminori Matsuyama (Department of Economics Northwestern University); Iryna Sushko (Institute of Mathematics, National Academy of Science, Ukraine); Laura Gardini (Facoltà di Economia Università degli Studi di Urbino)
    Abstract: We propose and analyze a two-country model of endogenous innovation cycles. In autarky, innovation fluctuations in the two countries are decoupled. As the trade costs fall and intra-industry trade rises, they become synchronized. This is because globalization leads to the alignment of innovation incentives across firms based in different countries, as they operate in the increasingly global (hence common) market environment. Furthermore, synchronization occurs faster (i.e., with a smaller reduction in trade costs) when the country sizes are more unequal, and it is the larger country that dictates the tempo of global innovation cycles with the smaller country adjusting its rhythm to the rhythm of the larger country. These results suggest that adding endogenous sources of productivity fluctuations might help improve our understanding of why countries that trade more with each other have more synchronized business cycles.
    Keywords: Endrogenous innovation cycles and productivity co-movements, globalization, home market effect, synchronised vs. asynchronised cycles, synchronisation of coupled oscillators, basins of attraction, two-dimensional piecewise smooth, noninvertable maps
    JEL: C61 E32 F12 F44 O31
    Date: 2014–12
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cfm:wpaper:1527&r=tid
  6. By: Roel van Elk; Bas ter Weel; Karen van der Wiel; Bram Wouterse; Bart Verspagen
    Abstract: This paper analyses the economic returns to public R&D investments in 22 OECD countries. We exploit a dataset containing time-series from 1963 to 2011 and estimate and compare the outcomes of different types of production function models. Robustness analyses are performed to test the sensitivity of the outcomes for particular model specifications, sample selections, assumptions with respect to the construction of R&D stocks, and variable definitions. Analyses based on Cobb-Douglas and translog production functions mostly yield statistically insignificant or negative returns. In these models we control for private and foreign R&D investments and the primary production factors. Models including additional controls, such as public capital, the stock of inward and outward foreign direct investment, and the shares of high-tech imports and exports, yield more positive returns. Our findings suggest that public R&D investments do not automatically foster GDP and TFP growth. The economic return to scientific research seems to depend on the specific national context.
    JEL: I23 O11 O40 O47
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpb:discus:313&r=tid
  7. By: Ceren Ozgen (VU University Amsterdam); Cornelius Peters (IAB); Annekatrin Niebuhr (Christian-Albrechts-Universitat zu Kiel); Peter Nijkamp (VU University Amsterdam); Jacques Poot (University of Waikato)
    Abstract: Increasing international labor migration has important effects on the workforce composition of firms in all migrant-receiving countries. The consequences of these changes for firm performance have attracted growing attention in recent years. In this paper, we focus explicitly on the impact of cultural diversity among migrant employees on the innovativeness of firms. We briefly synthesize empirical evidence from a range of contexts across Europe, North America, and New Zealand. We then utilize two unique and harmonized linked employer–employee datasets to provide comparative microeconometric evidence for Germany and the Netherlands. Our panel datasets contain detailed information on the generation of new products and services, determinants of innovation success, and the composition of employment in establishments of firms over the period 1999 to 2006. We find that innovation in both countries is predominantly determined by establishment size and industry. Moreover, obstacles encountered and organizational changes faced by firms drive innovation too. With respect to the composition of employment, the presence of high-skilled staff is most important. Cultural diversity of employees has a positive partial correlation with product innovation. The size and statistical significance of this effect depends on the econometric model specification and the country considered. We conclude from the literature synthesis and the new comparative evidence that cultural diversity of employees can make a positive, but modest and context dependent, contribution to innovation.
    Date: 2014–12
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nor:wpaper:2014009&r=tid
  8. By: Ceren Ozgen (VU University Amsterdam); Peter Nijkamp (VU University Amsterdam); Jacques Poot (University of Waikato)
    Abstract: An important question for firms and policymakers is whether the recruitment of foreign workers can boost innovation. Migration studies have demonstrated positive economic impacts of cultural diversity on productivity and innovation at the regional level, but the impacts at firm level are less well known. Merging data from four different sources, provided by Statistics Netherlands, we construct and analyze a unique linked employer-employee micro dataset of 4582 firms that includes qualitative information on firm innovation. We consider both the number of immigrants these firms employ and their cultural diversity. Potential endogeneity of migrant employment is addressed by an instrumental variables approach that accounts for the past geographic distribution of immigrants and the past culinary diversity of the municipality the firm is located in. We find robust evidence that firms employing relatively more migrants are less innovative. However, there is evidence of integration in that this effect is generall less strong or even absent for second generation immigrants. Moreover, firms employing a more diverse foreign workforce are more innovative, particularly in terms of product innovations. The benefits of diversity for innovation are more apparent in sectors employing relatively more skilled immigrants.
    Keywords: Immigration,Innovation,Cultural diversity, Knowledge spillovers,Netherlands
    JEL: D22 F22 O31
    Date: 2013–12
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nor:wpaper:2013026&r=tid

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